


Imperfections 6: What Comes Around

by Dasha (Dasha_mte)



Series: Imperfections [6]
Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-03-01
Updated: 2011-03-01
Packaged: 2017-10-16 00:48:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/166658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dasha_mte/pseuds/Dasha
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Something unexpected comes up.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Imperfections 6: What Comes Around

**Author's Note:**

> Notes: I should say something clever at this point. Or at least apologize. I can't think of anything though. Except 'thank you.' To everybody. (But especially Martha)
> 
> Disclaimer: Jim, Blair, Simon, and The Sentinel belong to Pet Fly, UPN, and Paramount and no copyright infringement is intended. So: not Mine. Not even rented, really. Just sort of borrowed. I'll give them back when I'm done.

Jim lay awake in peaceful dimness. The thick walls couldn't keep out the voices of the pre-dawn birds or the soft rustle of monks waking and dressing. He turned over restlessly. Quiet. It was so damned quiet.

For the first two and a half days, he had liked that quiet. It had been relaxing. No sirens. No neighbors fighting. No kids with colic. No crunch of fender benders six blocks down. It had been a blissful relief, at first. Sandburg had been right. Quiet and safe was just what Jim had needed.

But by last night the quiet had started to get to him. It was boring and worrisome at the same time. So much quiet was hardly natural. And what kind of world would *really* be so peaceful? No, the danger must still be out there lurking. Just out of earshot. Like it had been when Jim's ears were normal....

It was a ridiculous anxiety. Baseless. This was a monastery, for heaven's sake. There were twenty-three brothers and nine guests--and most of the monks and all of the guests were sentinels or guides. There was nothing to be on watch for here.

There had been a murder here last spring. Three, actually.

Unable to stand it any longer, Jim got up. Silently, so that he wouldn't disturb Blair, sound asleep in the second bed. The unnerving silence wasn't bothering him, after all.

Quietly, he slipped into the hallway. It was unlit, but he could see well enough. The people in the rooms on this hall were guests, not monks, and they were still sleeping. He could hear the monks outside, though, going about their morning chores. The monastery made its living from cheese and honey. Exquisite, expensive stuff, just what you'd expect with sentinels providing quality control.

For almost seven hundred years, everyone had thought that St. Sebastian of Shrewsbury had been a patron saint of the insane. The tiny hospices erected in his name and according to his Rule were known to work miracles with a tiny portion of the poor, demented souls who sought it out. Or maybe it was just a random sprinkling of miracles. Or maybe it was all imagined. The Church had accepted the order with very little comment and no attention until about a hundred years ago, when one of the monks read Burton's work on sentinels. It changed everything.

St. Sebastian was the patron of *guides* now. The long, low buildings weren't called 'hospices' any more. They were a 'refuge.' There were two in the United States and one in Canada. They trained the guides who worked in Catholic private schools. Those sentinels who became monks--and a quiet life spent searching for meaning was apparently a more popular choice than Jim ever would have guessed--served in one of them. St. Sebastian's was the largest. The monk-guides did research, conducted workshops for sentinels, guides, and curious lay people, and provided a retreat for sentinels looking for a safe, quiet place. And they supported three African missions from the profits of their honey and cheese business.

Outside, the sun was up, but a glittering, white mist had settled over the valley. Sunglasses took care of the glare, but the haze was thick enough that he couldn't see the Women's house across the cow pasture. He could hear it, though. A woman--very young, he thought--was crying and another was speaking very reasonably. It was probably nothing too dangerous....

A male order, the Sebastianites couldn't ignore that women were sentinels, too. And more than half of all guides were women. A pair of Franciscan nuns watched over the women's house and its guests.

Jim could make out the conversation now. The young woman--her accent was difficult to follow--was apparently Buddhist. She was overwhelmed and confused and a little afraid. The nun's patience and reasonableness seemed to be making things worse, though Jim couldn't guess why.

There was a footstep behind him. Jim glanced back and down, saw a hem of brown robe. One of the monks. There was no point in speaking to him. Sebastianites kept silence from five to seven every morning. He lifted a hand in greeting and tried to see the house through the mist.

"Sleep deprivation," said a voice beside him.

Jim's head snapped up and around, then at his watch. Had he been listening that long? Had he zoned? But it was only six-twelve. He gaped.

The monk was an older man, with grey hair and a slight stoop to his shoulders. "Oh," he said softly. "It's not a devotional practice. The silence is because our guests are sentinels, and they are sleeping." He nodded across the field. "Sleep is necessary. Sister Maria should give up trying to be kind and just fix the child some catnip tea. Or a tumbler full of wine." He frowned. "Do Hindus drink?"

"I don't know." He thought Blair would. "Why does her guide let this go on?" The question was involuntary, and nearly complete before Jim realized that he knew better. Some guides wouldn't give a damn. Some guides could *cause* this much panic and hysteria. Amazing! That he could forget that, even for a minute, was a revelation.

"She may not have one yet. I don't know. I don't get reports on our guests any more."

Surprised, Jim gave the monk a good look. Face and name came together. This man didn't take meals with the others. He didn't work with the other, or stop to chat with guests. He had been pointed out to Jim from a distance, by a young novice speaking in a horrified whisper. Brother Jeremy. Until a year a go, he'd been the abbot of St. Sebastian's. His guide had been a renowned expert on sentinel mood disorders. He'd written a dozen articles and lectured every couple years at Rainier and the University of Washington. He'd also been a protected federal witness, hiding from the mob. The murders last spring had been an attempt to get at him. In a monastery full of sentinels, the killer hadn't gotten away, but by the time he'd been identified, it was too late.

Belatedly--but acutely--uncomfortable, Jim looked away. Losing his guide to violence had nearly destroyed Adrian. Jim could almost imagine....

He did not want to. He would not think how close it had just come to losing Blair.

"Her mother, I think," the monk said, and Jim shifted his attention back to the women's house. There was a third voice now, speaking in an accent that nearly obliterated all sense of the content. "And the drama is over."

The prediction came true almost at once. The crying stopped. The volume dropped to something Jim could ignore. He turned away.

To be polite, he said, "It's very nice here." It was lame, but the best he could do.

The old monk glanced at him once in casual acuity and said, "Not what you expected."

Jim winced. "Well...I didn't know what to expect." The hedging wasn't fooling anyone. Jim hated talking to other sentinels. Or at least he hated trying to get polite lies past them. "Well, truthfully, I thought it would be a nightmare, with lots of praying and singing and eating bread and water. But I was a late bloomer. I'm generally very ignorant." He had discovered that being a late bloomer excused a lot.

Brother Jeremy nodded gravely. "Have you made use of any of the workshops?"

"No, I--" Blair had handed him the schedule, but said nothing either for or against any of the activities. Jim, who had been afraid of being pushed into gung-ho participation, had ignored t he schedule in order to find out if Sandburg really would leave him alone. "I'm trying to take things slowly." A lame and pointless thing to say, and the pale, flat eyes looking back at him knew it.

"Ah," Brother Jeremy said. He understood, but wasn't engaged enough to care very much, so Jim didn't get the rebuke he probably deserved. It was a bit disorienting, being let off. A couple of his teachers in school had been monks. They hadn't tolerated laziness.

Blair, come to think of it, wasn't usually very sympathetic to laziness either. Normally, unless the caseload was truly brutal, they were at the sentinel gym at Rainier two or three times a week doing exercises. Since they'd arrived, though, Sandburg had not suggested Jim do anything. Perhaps because he was spending all the time he could quizzing monks on what they'd observed of sentinels in groups.

Thinking about it, Jim glanced sideways at Brother Jeremy and asked, "You get more sentinels here in one time than most places ever see. Do you...I mean, have you noticed anything special about the way sentinels act in groups?"

For a moment there was a flash of curiosity. "An interesting question. I think....You don't see sentinels interacting in groups larger than two, usually. No matter how many there are on hand."

"Oh."

"And often when they do....so often, we are all in such different places--metaphorically speaking--that the communications are usually not very significant."

Not very significant. "Oh," Jim said. "That's not...my experience."

For the first time, the pale eyes fastened on Jim's and held his gaze. "How so?"

"Look, I don't--" *I don't know how to be a sentinel. I don't know what it means. I don't have a fucking clue who I am any more.* But he couldn't say any of that. He couldn't even say it out loud to Blair, and he was pretty sure Blair already understood. "Do you ever see animals?" He hadn't meant to say *that* but the question was out while he was tangled in everything else he shouldn't say.

"No," Brother Jeremy said, and Jim felt himself begin to color with embarrassment. While he was looking for a way to pass the question off as idle curiosity, though, Jeremy was still talking. "I see saints." A tiny smile. "Hardly a surprise, given my background."

"You see...saints," Jim repeated, feeling slightly surreal.

"My own patron saint. And Saint Mark."

His mouth dry, Jim asked, "How often?"

"A couple of times a month. Recently....more frequently."

More frequently. Since his guide died. Jim closed his eyes.

"Either answer is upsetting," Brother Jeremy said gently. "Either seeing these things is a sign of mental instability--and after all, it's generally known that grief has made me somewhat detached from the world--or the visitations are real, and what does that say about the state of our souls?"

"They're real," Jim said. "It's not just my subconscious. Or intuition. Or stress."

"Your guide doesn't believe you?" A guess, kindly delivered.

"Oh, no. Blair believes. He's a complete flake that way."

"You wish he didn't believe you?"

"I wish it wouldn't happen."

"Ah. I can't help you with that. Reality is difficult enough, without denying parts of it." With a kind, almost-smile the old monk turned away and made for the back garden.

Jim could hear Sandburg waking up. About three hundred feet away and inside a building and Jim could hear it. He sighed. That wasn't normal.

Blair was muttering to himself. "He's fine. Leave him alone." And then, "Nothing bad is going to happen to him here. He's fine."

It was just guide-fussing, Jim told himself. Blair wasn't actually worried. He was just trying to control the urge to check. Blair knew that the babysitting other sentinels considered normal, Jim found constraining and invasive. Adrian almost never left his townhouse alone. Jack and Marsha were apart while he worked at the university, but they talked on the phone four or five times during the day. Sentinels hardly seemed to have--what was the word? Boundaries where guides were concerned. Jim--

Even before the horrors of his first guide, Jim couldn't imagine just handing his autonomy and privacy over to someone else. No, never. But he'd been so exhausted and sick by the time he'd met Blair. He'd been desperate. He'd wanted to be able to work and....He'd just wanted to be free a little from the terror. He would have done anything, but as it had turned out, Blair had been kind. It hadn't been hard.

And--Jim could admit that Sandburg knew a lot of things he didn't. He could do what he was told, when he needed to. Having a shadow looking over his shoulder was hard, though. And Sandburg knew it.

Jim went back to their cell in the guest wing. He met Blair coming back from the bathroom down the hall. He smelled of soap and toothpaste and, seeing Jim, a little of relief. "Morning."

"Hey, Jim. How's the weather?"

"Warm," Jim said absently. "No rain today." He caught the tail end of Blair's smirk and made a face. "You're using me for weather reports now?"

"Well, no. I mean, I really need to test you out some more. See if you're any good at it. Not everybody can."

Laughing, Jim caught Blair from behind and pulled him into a head lock. "You little shit!"

"Oh, good, Jim. Curse in the monastery. You only offended the monks who can hear you--oh, wait. Half a dozen of them are sentinels--" He broke off as Jim tossed him onto the bed.

"Just you be nice to me, Chief. Or I'll lull you into a false sense of security and then lie."

Sputtering, Blair protested, "That's not very nice!"

"Nice? That's the best you can do? I'm not nice. I'm a cop. A real hard ass. I'm not nice."

"Well, obviously not, if you'd send your poor guide out into the snow in a tee shirt or something." He brightened. "Of course, to make it convincing, you'd have to be in the tee shirt, too."

Jim flipped him off and dug out his shaving kit. "And don't tell me the monks saw that. It's not x-ray vision."

"You were up pretty early, Jim. Are you having any trouble sleeping? Is it too loud here?"

"Too *loud*? You have to be kidding!"

"Because I've got a white noise generators."

"They aren't allowed," Jim said, surprised.

"Not big room ones. But ear plugs." He produced a small box from his suit case.

"No, it's not the noise. I--" Jim scowled. "I had a nightmare."

"Oh?"

Jim set down the shaving kit and sat down, remembering. "Lee--" he took a deep breath and made himself say it calmly. "Was teaching me pattern breathing." An image flashed through him, as much memory as dream: Jim, face down on the floor with one arm twisted up behind him and Lee Brackett's knee pressing between Jim's shoulder blades.

"Does this happen a lot?"

"No."

"Jim...it's going to happen sometimes. You've been getting past it, what--what Brackett did, but it's going to take time--"

"I've been checking my messages. On my phone. In the office up front."

"Okay?" Blair said carefully.

"Simon called. Lee has a preliminary hearing next week. The DA is going to need some more statements when we get back."

"Damn."

Jim tried to smile. "Sentinel monks, Chief."

"You're going to be fine. We--we knew there would be a trial. We're going to put him away. Jim, there's no way--he can't hurt you now."

"I know. It's going to be fine. I know." Jim managed a thin smile, finally. "I testify against assholes all the time. This isn't any different."

Blair sat down beside him. "It is different. But you can do this. And it's going to be *good*, putting this monster away. It's going to be good, Jim."

"I know. I know." Jim rubbed his sweaty hands along his jeans and took a deep breath. "Let's get a move on. We'll miss breakfast."

"Jim--"

"I'm ok." He retrieved the kit and retreated to the bathroom.

It was a lovely day, warm and mild, just as Jim had predicted. He spent the morning sitting on the hill overlooking the bee hive, watching the birds flitting through the trees on the far side of the meadow.

He could see them as closely as if they were sitting in his lap. They were little grey birds. Small. Nothing special. But they were interesting. Every twitch of muscle, every flick of a feather was clear and sharp, beautifully perfect. Jim would have sworn they had facial expressions. He watched them look for food and build nests and warn one another off. He could almost understand, watching the little things hop along the ground, why Blair and Jack some times called the heightened senses 'gifts.'

Almost.

Blair was doing a work shift, helping pack jars of honey into boxes for the monastery's mail order customers. As always, he was talking about sentinels. Here, at least, it seemed to be a subject that never got old. Even when Blair couldn't get anybody to agree with him, the monks were happy enough to talk.

"I'm just saying that we're not just guides. We're trained as anthropologists. There's no reason why we can't study sentinel society just as we'd study any other."

"Sentinels don't have a society. Sentinels belong with guides, not other sentinels. We're their society. What could they have to offer each other?"

"I don't know. Someone they have something in common with, maybe? Other people who have gone through the same experiences?"

"I'm not saying it doesn't make sense. On the surface, at least. But the fact is they don't congregate. Where is your sentinel right now? If we were allowed to bet, I'd give you three to one odds that he's not found a pack of other sentinels to set up a glee club or play bridge with. Even here, sentinels aren't social creatures. Not with each other."

After lunch, Jim took his guide for a walk past the pasture that was used as a driving range. There was a small creek, which would serve as some natural sound masking. "Maybe it's me," Jim said.

"Maybe it's you what?"

"Maybe other sentinels--aren't interested in each other. Maybe it's just me. I never learned to be a sentinel. And you can teach me to use the senses, but you can't teach me--you can't teach me to be a sentinel. But most of the others don't have that problem. Maybe...it is a non-issue."

"Okay, that's true. I'm pushing, I know that. I've been pushing you to get involved, to get closer to people. With everybody, though, not just sentinels. And, yeah, you don't show *more* interest in sentinels than you do in anyone else. But you don't show any less. And Jim? Were you listening to all of that? 'What could sentinels offer each other?' Jeeze. That's just guide arrogance. There's something there, I know it. And even if I'm wrong, I won't learn anything by assuming nothing is going on."

"You would have been good in research."

"Yeah, well. I'm just as glad it's just a hobby. Thank you."

"Um. Yeah. Speaking of thanks." Jim took a deep breath. "I'm really grateful. I wanted you to know. I appreciate what you've done for me."

"Jim. Everything I did, you had a right to. It was my job."

Jim picked up a rock and tossed it into the shallow stream. "You've been a good friend," he said.

"Okay. I'll accept that," Blair said.

Jim thought of Brother Jeremy. The assassin had cut the phone lines. Brother Marcus had bled to death in his sentinel's arms because there had been no way to call for an ambulance. The truly frightening part, though, was that monks weren't usually in the line of fire. Blair could expect danger as long as he was working with the police. "So, thank you," he said.

Blair looked away for a moment. "Ok," he said. "Ok, my turn. Right? I know I freak and I worry and I don't give you any space--"

"Blair don't--"

"Listen to this. I know it might not always seem like I think so--but you are doing so well. I am *so* proud of you--no, wait. Not proud of you. I can't take credit for that. Proud to be with you. You have been so strong and so brave. You've come so far, so fast, and you've made it *easy*, Jim--"

"Easy. Right. Tell me another one."

"Jim. For a lot of people...it would have been too late." Sandburg's eyes made it clear what he meant, although he would never say 'dying' out loud. "You turned around so fast. You're working. You're learning. You travel. You're healthy. You sleep." He glanced away suddenly. "I can't imagine how you'd do with a guide who had a little experience and maybe some patience."

"I don't want anybody else!"

"I don't want to be anywhere else, Jim."

Jim nodded, relieved that he'd managed to get through that, happy it was over. "I've been thinking of trying one of the workshops."

"Really? Which one?"

"Remedial imagery meditation."

"Cool."

They stayed at the monastery two more days. Jim tried two of the workshops. Both of them were dismal failures. Well, the first one didnt do anything for him and the second one probably counted as a failure. It was a relaxation class. It had worked up to a point; Jim had relaxed so well he fell asleep--but then he'd dreamed of Brackett. He'd come awake with a yell and a wave of terror-stench that had thoroughly scared the other two sentinels in the class with him.

When they finally went home, Jim thought it was about time.

***

Blair was learning that there was an art to watching sentinels. You had to watch without too much expectation. You had to let go, both of what you wanted to see and what you were afraid to see. You couldn't be so desperate for things to be fine that you ignored the shifts in line and posture that said your partner was tired or spiking. And it didn't do any good to just assume that there was always something wrong. Fussing when things were fine just made Jim annoyed--or worse, afraid.

Walking behind Jim as they carried their bags to the SUV, Blair tried to put aside his projections and just pay attention to the moment. Jim was moving easily enough. He didnt seem distracted. He wasnt happy, really, but he was calm.

Jim tossed Blair his cell as they drove out the front gate. "Check the messages, Chief?"

There was just one. "Simon wants to know if we're coming in tomorrow. He's got a weird one."

"Are we?"

"What, going in?"

"Yeah, am I cleared for duty?"

Blair turned the phone over in his hands. "Are you?" he asked. "I mean, if you need more time, I'll tell Simon not yet."

"That's not an answer."

"Jim, I think you're bored and we've hit the point of diminishing returns. But if you think you need more time out of all that pressure, I'm not going to argue."

"Hey, I didn't want time off to begin with." He braked at the intersection with the main road before continuing. "When the weather is warmer, I want to go down the coast, maybe do some surfing."

Blair could see how that would be attractive, especially now. He'd never surfed himself, but he could imagine that it didn't leave a lot of room in your head for thinking. Pure sensory experience, strong and physical, your mind only on your body. Exhilarating. Intoxicating. Probably great for stress relief.

Possibly pure suicide, if you got overwhelmed by the sensory input. A mistake out in the water-- "Are you good at it?"

"Yeah, Chief. I'm good at it."

The trip back to Cascade took three hours. It was early afternoon when they finally parked and unloaded the car. Blair, distracted by a loose strap on his bag didn't notice anything was wrong until Jim caught his arm and pulled him back. "What?"

Jim pointed to the door of 307. It was ajar. Shit.

Jim was listening. After a few moments he said, "Nobody home," and flung the door the rest of the way open.

Peering over Jim's shoulder, Blair gasped. "It's been trashed!"

"Nope. It's been tossed. Call it in, Chief, and then give me a hand scoping it out."

Jim wandered from room to room with his eyes nearly shut, smelling and tasting the air. Blair stayed behind him, careful not to touch anything, trying not to think about the fact that his *home* was a crime scene.

Jim cursed. Softly, steadily he snarled to himself at the edge of Blair's hearing. "Hey," Blair said. "Easy."

"Nothing. God damn it. I'd know them, if I smelled them again, but there's nothing to trace them with. No expensive cologne. No imported cigarettes."

"How many were there?" Blair asked.

"Two. One of them wore leather. They had guns."

"You're doing great--"

"God damn it, they were here!"

"How long ago, man?"

"Today. This morning. Six, seven hours ago, I don't know."

The place was a mess. There wasn't a lot of breakage, although one of the lamps had been knocked over. Personal papers had been dug through and tossed on the floor. Even the drawer in the kitchen that held the take out menus had been dumped. But nothing valuable was missing. They didn't have much a thief would want, but Blair's laptop was still in its case beside his bed and the silver teapot Jim had inherited from his grandmother was still on its shelf.

Before they could get any further, Simon and the evidence team arrived. "Oh, come on," Jim groused. "Not the fingerprint kit. They wore gloves. You won't find anything with that."

Serena sighed sympathetically. "You know its policy, Jim."

"It gets everywhere. I'll never get it cleaned up."

Gently, Blair took him out into the hall.

"Jim," Simon said, "don't take this the wrong way. But you're supposed to be on the other side of the investigation. Putting you down as a B&E victim is going to play games with my records."

Serena poked her head out the door. "Detective? Did you take the tape out of your answering machine?"

Of course not. Neither of them had. But that little clue, whatever it might be worth, was all either Jim or the forensic team could find in almost two hours.

After they left, Jim and Blair spent the evening cleaning up. It was nine-thirty before Jim was satisfied that the loft was clean enough to live in. By then it was too late to cook even if they hadn't needed to go shopping. Blair ordered in pizza and sent Jim to shower.

Jim seemed ok. Annoyed and puzzled, but not overwrought. Still, none of Blair's text books had covered the stress symptoms a sentinel might exhibit *after having his house broken into and violated*. Geeze, it didn't even sound like a problem you got in the real world.

He picked up the phone and called Jack Kelso. "You are not going to believe this," he said without preamble.

"Welcome back, Blair. Have a nice retreat?"

"Yeah. Lovely. While we were gone we had a home invasion." He explained as quickly as he could.

"I wouldn't worry," Jack said. "This isn't shocking or unusual to Jim. Well, a little, because it's him. But this isn't personal. It's professional. A case, and Jim is going to handle it like a case."

"Right. Yeah."

"I assume he's cleaned, reestablished possession of his home?"

"Yeah. Oh, yeah. He wanted to send me out to buy bleach."

"And you won that argument? So don't worry. This is his job, and he knows how to handle it."

"Right. Thanks," Blair said, trying to sound convinced.

"Look, I'll call tomorrow, all right? Check on things."

"Thanks, Jack. I appreciate this."

The pizza arrived as Jim came out of the shower. Even after all the excitement (and even with the loft smelling like vinegar and hydrogen peroxide) Jim's appetite was fine. Blair felt much better after watching his partner polish off half a pizza.

The next morning, Simon headed them off at the elevator and sent them back down to the pass-through to the morgue to take a look at the body that was stymieing Major Crimes so thoroughly.

"It turned up in the trunk of an abandoned car down by the beach yesterday morning. No ID and signs of torture. We don't have a single lead and the press is going to get wind of this any minute now."

Dan Wolf was more specific. Blair wished he hadn't been. "It's fresh--I'd say less than 8 hours old when it was found. The torture looks professional to me, but it's not my specialty. I've sent pictures out for consultation."

"What about prints?" Jim asked as they followed Dan into the lab. "How soon do we expect an ID?"

"No prints. The hands were removed post-mortem." He shook his head. "This is a nasty one, Jim."

Blair took a deep breath and locked his jaw, trying not to imagine someone being tortured and then mutilated. Damn. Every time he started to think he was ok with the whole 'forensic evidence thing' there was a new surprise. Jeeze.

Pulling on his gloves, Jim gave Blair a knowing look and motioned him back. Jim was already narrowing in, thinking in details, letting go of the horrifying big picture so that he could do his job. Blair turned toward the corner. When the metal table slid out, he jumped slightly. He tried not to listen as Dan unwrapped the body.

Blair took a deep breath and tried to think casual thoughts. The deep breath was a mistake, though. The morgue had a subtle stink that didn't take Blair's mind off what was going on behind him.

And then Jim made a noise, a quiet hiss that seemed to catch in his throat and end abruptly. Blair spun around and caught Jim from behind, trying to pull him back.

Jim didn't move.

Alarmed, Blair tried to shove himself between Jim and the body. "Get back. Come on, Jim." Jim was solid. He wouldn't move. Blair glanced back at the body behind him. He couldn't *see* anything that would hurt Jim, but then he wouldn't. He looked up at Jim's face. It revealed nothing. "Damn it--"

"I know him."

Blair stopped trying to shove him back. He tried to readjust his thinking. Not a chemical exposure.

"I--I know him."

"You're kidding," Dan said. "*You* can identify the body?"

"It's Holland. Sam Holland. We...I knew him in the army." Jim gently detached himself from Blair and stepped back.

There was a long silence.

Stupidly, uselessly, Blair asked, "Are you okay?"

Jim blinked. "Sure. Fine." He adjusted his gloves and stepped up again. He began his examination the same as Blair had seen him do half a dozen times. "They were improvising," Jim said, his hands hovering over a set of uneven round marks along the left arm. "This was made by a car's cigarette lighter....Here and here, they just hit him...I'm not seeing any needle marks."

"No," Dan agreed, "I didn't either."

"They were in a hurry. All of this was done not long before they killed him. Two hours at the outside."

The phone rang. Dan turned away to get it. Jim walked slowly around the body, lifting the souls of the bare feet and peering closely. Blair made himself look at the face. Average build. Pleasant face. Pale hair. What would he have looked like living?

"Well, that's it," Dan said, coming back. "That was Captain Banks on the phone. The feds have jumped our jurisdiction. Somebody's on the way to claim the body right now."

"What? No! they can't!" But Jim knew very well that the feds *could*. Hurrying now, he turned back to the body of his former comrade. "No. Not yet." But his focus was gone. In less than five minutes he heard the agents in the outer office, and he had not managed one new coherent observation in that time. His jaw set, Jim stormed out, chucking the gloves in the direction of the garbage as he passed.

They went to Simon, of course, who listened interestedly to Jim's report but couldn't help them.

"I can file a protest, but you know it won't go anywhere. Look, Jim, I'm sorry about this. Really. Our hands are tied."

"Damn it, Simon--"

"I don't like it either. But the federal government says it's classified, and that's it. Besides, you have your own problems. Remember?"

Blair hadn't said anything, not down in the morgue and not in Simon's office. He followed Jim to his desk, sat down across from him and waited.

"I don't like this," Jim said. "Something is going down, and it's nasty."

"Jim, I know you have to be upset--"

"This isn't about me being upset. Okay? I don't need you to be my guide right now, I need you to think like a cop and stay focused on the case."

"We don't have a case," Blair said gently. Jim's glare stopped him from continuing that line of thought.

"I haven't talked to him in six or seven years. Last I heard he was working out in Florida somewhere."

"So he was out of the army? Working for the private sector?"

"Maybe." Jim woke up his computer. "Not that anything'll turn up. If whatever is going on is classified, I won't be able to run much of a background check."

Blair's phone rang. "Sandburg," he said, his mind still mostly on Jim.

"It's Jack. I'm just calling to see how Jim is doing."

"Doing?" Blair repeated, not knowing what to say.

"Yeah. How's he dealing with yesterday's break-in."

Oh. Right. "Actually, something came up here, and he's pretty much forgotten about it." Blair chewed his lower lip, caught for a moment between thinking like a cop and thinking like a guide. "An old army buddy of his got killed early yesterday morning. It was nasty. I mean a really nasty murder. And now the feds are all over it. The whole thing's classified. And I think Jim thinks whatever it is isn't over yet."

"What a shame," Jack said. After a moment, he added, "What was his name?"

"Sam Holland."

Jack, I know you still have contacts and I know you still hear things--But Blair hesitated a long moment before saying it. This was not the business Jack was in, and it was a hell of a big favor. "Jack, I know--"

"Blair, I'm late for a faculty meeting. I'll call you back in a couple of hours."

"Right. Sure."

Jim spent almost an hour chasing for some kind of lead on the Holland case. No one would talk to him. No information was available. Eventually, he gave up and began to go through his files, calling contacts who might have tried to get in touch with him while he was gone. It didn't help that he didn't have a clue who would have information so important somebody would break in for it.

"It was Holland who called you," Blair said softly. "Wasn't it?"

"Probably, yeah. But it might have been somebody else." He went back to dialing.

Blair's cell rang. "Blair, it's Jack. We need to talk. I just got some really interesting information."

Blair closed his eyes briefly. Of course Jack was coming through for them. He always did. Blair was going to be in debt to this man for the rest of his life. "Great. What is it?"

"Not over the phone, all right? I have an appointment at the student union in a couple minutes. Why don't we meet out front afterwards? Say, half an hour?"

Jim only nodded absently when Blair said he had to meet with his advisor. He did give a promise not to go running off without back-up, and to call if he needed a guide. It helped that Blair wouldn't be gone long. It helped more that he was borrowing Jim's SUV. He wouldn't be going out without back-up if he had no wheels.

Blair was early. He'd been pacing up and down the sidewalk for five minutes when Jack finally came out of the Student Union. He collected Blair with a nod and said (without the usual preface of questions about Jim's health and mental state) "How much do you know about Sam Holland?"

Blair fell into step beside the chair. "He was in Jim's unit in Peru. For a while, anyway. He's out of the army now. Jim thinks he was working in Florida somewhere."

Jack scowled. Apparently, Blair's ignorance didnt please him. "Graf Technologies. It's a CIA front."

"So he was still in covert ops. Damn. This is bad, isn't it?"

"Worse then you think. Graf Technologies is run by Colonel Norman Oliver -- longtime company guy. I remember meeting him once in about fifteen years ago. He was a sniper, the best I ever saw. He could shoot a man out of a tree at twelve hundred yards."

It was weird--nearly surreal--hearing Jack talking like this. It wasn't a secret, what he'd done before going into research, and Blair had seen flashes of this side of him before. It didn't match the man Blair knew. It didn't sit well with the dozens of hours he'd spent in Jack's classes, taking notes on lectures about stress management techniques or the importance of communication.

"But that is not why we are having this conversation. Oliver was the CIA contact who provided Ellison and his team with their intelligence for the mission."

Blair blinked. "Which landed them right in the middle of the insurgents where they got shot down."

"After Jim got rescued eighteen months later, he put the blame on Oliver for the screw-up. As you can imagine, this wasn't good for Oliver's career."

"Oh, God."

"And wherever Oliver is right now, he's not in his office in Florida."

"You don't know what he's doing--?"

"Nobody I've talked to has a clue. And maybe he's just...out in the field doing is job. After all, one of his guys just turned up tortured and mutilated with no clues." Jack shrugged. "There's some stuff on my computer I think you should see."

They were turning the corner, just coming within sight of the anthropology building, when everything went to hell. There was a noise, a popping sound that echoed flatly off the brick buildings of the quad. Blair knew the sound, but it was a something he heard with *Jim*, not something from Rainier, not from here.

But even while his brain was tangled in the wrongness of it, Blair's body was diving forward, shoving Jack ahead of him, trying to make it to the cover of the cement planters behind the bio building. It was only a few steps. They took forever, and the sounds of the shots kept coming.

The wheelchair jumped and then unbalanced. Blair, snarled in one of the wheels, tripped. He didn't fight the fall; down was good. The pain in his wrists and palms as he slammed into the sidewalk was a welcome relief. He was down, at least, and in the lee of the concrete planters. Safe.

The sound of shooting stopped.

For a moment there was silence. Then there was yelling. Panicked students, between classes. Blair began to shake a little. How had this happened here? "Jack? Jack you ok?"

There was no answer.

"Jack?" Fumbling, Blair reached for him, turned him gently. Blood. There was blood. Blair screamed for help, lost for a moment in his own panic. Jack--

It lasted only a moment. This was one of the people, after all, who had taught him to cope with emergencies. The copious supply of tissues he carried in his backpack made a pad he could hold in one hand and press in place over the wound. The wound in Jack's neck, damn it, oh God, that had to be bad. Entry wound and exit wound, but close together, at least. He could cover them both with one hand. He would just have to try to stop the bleeding and hope the blood flow to the brain wasn't completely fucked.

"Jack?" But maybe unconscious was better. This would have to hurt. And god, there was nothing Jack needed to be awake for right now.

With his free hand, Blair searched his teacher's still form for other injuries. His questing hand encountered no more blood, didn't feel anything suspicious or alarming. A slightly hysterical part of his brain jeered, 'well, it wasn't Colonel Oliver who fired on us.' There was no way a competent sniper could have managed to hit a target just once out of that many shots.

University security arrived then. They came at a dead run, yelling for people to clear the area. Blair hollered again for help, and then--he should have thought of this two or three minutes ago, what was wrong with him? fished his cell out of his backpack left-handed and speed dialed Jim.

"Ellison."

Blair opened his mouth to answer, did not know what to say.

"Sandburg? What's wrong?"

"Jack. Jack's been shot."

"What?" The response was more angry than confused, and it seemed to drag Blair's frantic thoughts back into focus.

"Jim, Jack's been shot. We're at the quad. The police are on the way, but I need you here."

"On my way."

***

"Joel, I need to borrow your car."

Joel looked up from his computer and smiled. His eyes held honest affection, but he said, "Have you lost your mind, Ellison, or do you just think I have?"

"Damn it, Blair's in trouble."

Immediately, Joel was on his feet headed for the door. Jim decided help was as good as borrowing the car and hurried after him.

"Where is he?"

"The university. There's been a shooting--"

Joel had more questions. Jim had no answers.

Jim didn't have to search for his partner. When they turned in at the north gate, even Joel could see the flashing lights from the emergency vehicles. Jim didn't wait until the car was in park to leap out. He called behind him, "Find out what we know," and hurried to Sandburg.

Jim had a hand on Sandburg's shoulder before he realized Jim was there. His eyes were on the gurney where the EMTs were working. He turned to Jim in speechless horror. For a moment Jim froze helplessly. There was nothing he could do in the face of this pain. Then, suddenly, Blair was in his arms. Jim could feel his heartbeat, strong and even. He didn't smell blood or pain, but the acrid edge that marked the beginning of shock tickled his nose. "You're ok. You're ok. We'll take care of this." God, how many times had Blair said that to him? "You stay here. I want to see Jack. Okay? I'll be right back."

Jim did not have to get close enough to touch the still form on the stretcher. Sound and scent were enough to tell him what he needed to know. He turned and went back to Sandburg. "Chief, you have to go with him. There's nobody else. I'll send Joel after you to back you up. Okay? But you know about hospitals. You have to go with him."

Blair blinked, gathered himself. "What about you?" he asked.

"I have to go get Marcia," he said.

For a moment he appeared to be confused, then, suddenly, he was focused and certain. "No, you can't. I know she'd want to be there, but she shouldn't be hanging out at hospitals. Between the germs and the stress--Jim, she's still considered a fragile sentinel. Jack wouldn't want her there."

Jim took a deep breath. "She needs to be here. We may lose him."

"Jim--no. No, it's not bad. Jack's going to--" He stopped, seeing something in Jim's face. "What is it?"

"I don't know. But this is bad. Marcia needs to be there."

"Okay. Okay."

"Where did you park the truck?"

It took fifteen minutes to get to Jack's house. The traffic wasn't heavy and Jim ran the lights. In no time Jim was standing on the porch and Marcia was opening the door. She sighed at the sight of him. "What do you want?"

"Jack's been shot. They're taking him to Baptist. You need to come."

She paused to set the alarm, but not to get her jacket, even though the day was very cold. She didn't speak until Jim had gotten them on the road. Then she said, "How bad is it?"

There was no point in lying to another sentinel. Knowing what cues would give you away didn't mean you could hide them. "It's bad."

"Do you know enough to give me details?"

"I don't know how much damage the bullet did or if it's still in him. He smelled like stagnant water....his heart was going too fast to count and it wasn't regular."

She nodded. "I see." And then, "Do you know what happened?"

"He was with Blair." It occurred to Jim only then that he didn't know what they'd been doing. He hadn't been paying attention when Blair had told him he was running off to his advisor for a few minutes. "Blair is still with him."

"That's good," she said, and Jim understood. The idea of being alone in a hospital with no one to keep watch or speak for you was terrifying in a way Jim couldn't have understood even a year before. Hospitals were dangerous, painful places where no one listened to you. It wasn't just sentinels who were at risk. Anyone could be the victim of a mistake. Sometimes mistakes could be deadly.

Marcia didnt talk any more on the way to the hospital.

Jim could hear Simon from the stairs half-way up the parking lot. The eavesdropping was enlightening, because he hadn't given much thought to the situation aside from the fact that one of the best friends he and Blair had might be dying and, since he was a guide, there were things that had to be done. Jim realized that wasn't like him. On any other case, he'd have been scouring the campus for trace evidence of the killers, not fetching next of kin. But there wasn't time to give that too much thought because Simon was in rare form:

"Sandburg, have you even read your job description? Oh, wait. You didn't need to. You've got a damn *degree* in your job description. So maybe you can tell me what you were doing involving a civilian in one of our cases?"

"We talk to experts all the time."

"What do you mean, 'we?' You are a guide, not a cop."

"I thought he might know something. And you know what? If the people who shot Jack are the people who killed Sam Holland, than there was at least the potential that he might have found out something important if he hadn't already."

Blair was being reasonable. Simon was ignoring it. "And what I can't believe is that your partner went along with this. This is a federal case--"

Jim winced as Simon went on and on. He wondered how much he should admit to. He hadn't really *noticed* that Blair had gone to Jack Kelso for information. He'd *heard* but it hadn't sunk in. There was no way he could come out and admit to that, though. If Simon thought he was a space cadet, it would not figure well when Simon made assignments. And besides, he couldn't leave Blair hanging out to dry, even though there was no question that Simon would be a lot harder on a detective than on the detective's guide.

They found Blair with Simon and Joel and two uniforms clustered in the waiting room outside of Emergency. The argument ended abruptly when Simon caught sight of them. Blair turned and waited for Marcia.

"How bad?"

"He was shot once in the neck. They have the bleeding stopped and there isn't any damage that can't be fixed, but they think he lost about five units of blood. They're replacing that as fast as they can....they did some x-rays to see if he was hurt in the fall. They're not back yet." Here, Blair wavered slightly, but he collected himself and continued. "He came around in the ambulance and he knew me, but he's sedated now. He...ah, he went into respiratory failure and they intubated him. Marcia, no!" he caught her arm as she turned toward the door that led to the treatment rooms. "He doesn't want you here. He told me--"

"And you faithfully reported the message," she said shortly. "Let go of my arm."

"Marcia, I'm so sorry. I got him into this. I never--"

Marcia glanced briefly at the ceiling and then turned back to glare at Blair. "You know, the smart thing to do when you don't know what the fuck you're talking about is to shut up." Jim found her voice even more harsh than usual. He wanted to step between them. He didn't let himself.

"I understand."

"No. You don't." She took a step closer to Blair. "Do you really think sentinel health is the only cause he's taken to heart? Doesn't it seem a little bit odd that he worked so fast he was able to frighten someone between breakfast and lunch? Now I don't think you really are stupid enough to think I would leave my guide alone when someone was trying to murder him, so let go of my arm and get back to work."

She stalked into the treatment area. The nurses seemed to think she was with the police, and didn't try to stop her. After a moment, Jim followed.

At some point he'd stopped thinking of emergency rooms as an unpleasant necessity and started thinking of them as places of unrelenting horror. Really, it would be a bad phobia to encourage. Maybe if he talked to Blair, there would be a way to change the way he felt....

Ruthlessly, he reminded himself that this was just another weakness that came with the senses. It wasn't important. Not really. Not really.

Jack had improved a great deal since Jim had seen him last. He stank of sedatives and antibiotics, but underneath it there was no smell of dying. His heart was fast and weak, but it wasn't failing now. Things were still *bad*, but it was the kind of bad that might be survived.

Marcia paused half in and half out of the wide doorway, her head bowed forward and hidden by a curtain of dark hair. Blair stepped up behind her. Jim hadn't realized he'd been followed, although in retrospect it was obvious that his guide wouldn't let them wander around a place like this alone.

"Marcia, he's going to be fine."

"Leave me alone. You don't know--"

"There are a lot of potential complications. We all know that. The doctors are being really careful. Jack is going to be fine. Please. Don't. Stay. Here."

"And you'll...what? leave a nice police officer here to protect him?"

"Yes," Jim said firmly. "He's a protected witness. We'll take care of him."

"And they're good, your local cops?" For Marcia, she was showing a lot of self control. No yelling, just contempt. "Good enough to take on a company assassin? Better than a sentinel? Better than a sentinel spook?" Her look said, 'you are large, but naive and stupid, and as sick as I've been, I could still take you.'

Sighing, Jim led Sandburg back out to the waiting room. "Now let me have it from the top. What happened?"

"I asked Jack if he'd heard anything about Sam Holland."

"Yes, I've gathered that. What did he find out?"

"He's been working for some kind of spy cover business. His boss was Norman Oliver. Right now, nobody seemed to know where Oliver was."

"And Jack thought he was in trouble?" Jim was surprised the question was audible and even.

"Um, no. I got the feeling he thought Oliver *was* trouble."

Jim tried to swallow. His mouth was too dry. "Tell me everything."

***

They went back to Rainier. There had been too much traffic through the area for Jim to find any traces of the sniper, so they headed up to Jack's office in Anthropology. The door was locked, but Blair had retrieved the keys from where they dropped when they'd fallen to cover. "I don't know what there will be to find. He's got to keep the really sensitive stuff locked up or put away somewhere."

"You said he had something on his computer to show you."

But when they turned the computer on, it failed to boot. Blair fussed for three or four minutes; no operating system, no nothing. He borrowed a start-up disk from the secretary. It was almost immediately obvious that everything was toast.

Jim tried to calm himself, slowly turning circles in the office, wishing he was one of those sentinels who had patterns jump out at him from ordinary background information.

He wasn't.

Blair, meanwhile, gave up on the computer, and dug around in the desk until he came up with a stack of floppy disks.

"You think he made a back-up?" Jim asked.

"Of whatever he learned this morning? Probably not. This is his research."

"Well that's no use!" Jim cursed and turned another circle in the room that told him nothing.

"Jim, it's his *research*. Somebody's destroying his stuff. He's...he's going to want this."

They didn't speak on the way back to the car. Blair smelled like hunger and the remains of burnt adrenalin. He smelled sad. And sorry.

"He...he smelled a lot better. He's going to be fine."

Blair rubbed his eyes. "Right. Yeah. Ok, so what have we got?"

The driver of a van three cars back was staring at the SUV. Jim made a sudden left onto Classen Avenue. A moment later the van turned, too. "We've got...lunch," Jim said.

Blair looked surprised, but he never argued with Jim eating. "Wonderburger again?"

"IHOP," Jim corrected. It was close, it had fewer windows, and this time of day, the shades would be down.

Blair shrugged. He wasn't really paying attention. He didn't say anything when Jim didn't wait for a hostess but firmly led him to a table next to the kitchen. "So what do you think--"

"You need to wait five minutes, and then go back out the front door and walk to the truck. Don't look like you're in a hurry."

"Jim? What?"

"Trust me on this. Five minutes."

***

Blair wouldn't have thought he'd had any more adrenalin, but suddenly he was alert and poised.

Five minutes? he thought.

The waitress brought water. Blair explained his partner was in the bathroom and nervously crunched some ice. It was sort of funny, he thought. He never would have guessed this morning what kind of day it would turn out to be.

Two minutes. Blair rubbed his sweaty hands across his jeans. What was Jim doing? And why was he doing it somewhere Blair was not?

At four minutes and forty-five seconds, Blair was up and headed for the door. He had barely made it half a dozen steps across the parking lot when he heard a thump and yelp, and turned to see Jim struggling with a smaller man who clearly didn't have a chance. Blair looked around, but except for his partner tossing his opponent onto the asphalt and pinning him, there was nothing unusual to see.

"Hey, Chief, you wanna call this in?"

"Uh, sure. What is it I'm calling?"

"I'll think of something. That is, assuming he lasts long enough to get processed."

The man on the ground was slight and blond. He was a little older than Jim. He looked up at them with bored contempt. "This won't accomplish anything. You don't have anything to hold me on."

Jim squatted beside him, smiling just a little. "Yeah, well. I'm not sure I'm going to bother processing you." He reached out and touched the man's shoulder, very gently. "You killed a guide. A man who was worth twenty of you. Maybe I'll just rough you up and 'let' you escape. If your boss thinks you gave him up, he'll take care of you for me. I can't say I'd mind that very much."

"You--you can't do that." He rallied. "Who do you think you're dealing with?"

"Who do I think I'm dealing with?" Jim laughed. It had a scary sound. "I'm a sentinel, and you just killed a guide. I'm not sure you *have* any information that is worth saving your miserable life at this point."

Now, finally there was flash of fear. The man looked at Blair, who quickly turned away. Jim really did seem convincingly homicidal. It was completely real. And completely ridiculous. He hid his face and bit his cheek to keep from laughing.

Except it *wasn't* funny. Blair had never seen Jim threaten a suspect. Not like this. And the threat would only last until the man found out Jack wasn't dead, which meant it was a risky ploy.

"Look, it, it wasn't me."

"Who was it, then?"

Blair held his breath, not sure that Jim had won, but hoping. Whatever the captive might have said, though, was drowned out by a squeal of tires and a loud bang. Blair jumped, and came crashing down as he was tackled from behind, Jim's voice cursing inches from his left ear. The banging continued, and Blair realized he was being shot at again. The irony of it made him laugh. Although, maybe it wasn't ironic. Maybe he was just hysterical.

Jim was lying across him. And squeezing. Blair couldn't lift his head or breathe. All he could see was the asphalt half an inch from his eyes.

And then there was silence. And then Jim was dragging him to his feet. "*Move* Sandburg. Let's go." Stumbling, Blair looked back. The suspect Jim had caught was still on the ground behind them. Dead, he must be, there was blood everywhere--

Jim was shoving him at the truck, and Blair dove in. The engine was running before he managed to shut the door. "Where are we going--Hey! Put on your seatbelt!" but they were already moving. "Jim, what--"

They pulled out onto Classen and promptly made an illegal left turn. "Be quiet," Jim said. "I can still hear them."

Jim wasn't driving particularly fast, but he was only paying the least attention to things like traffic and direction. Really, this should have been covered by a text book somewhere: "Car chases while zoning," maybe, or "Traffic retraining." Another illegal turn, this one also ignoring a stop sign. Blair wanted to close his eyes, but somebody really needed to pay attention.

"He's...meandering. He's trying to lose pursuit."

"Is there somebody following him besides you?"

"I don't think so. He's being cautious."

Nice that somebody was. They were going the wrong way up Maxwell. Fortunately, at this time of day, it was pretty empty.

They crossed under the highway and passed a cluster of industrial buildings. Blair wasn't entirely sure where they were. Suddenly, Jim slammed on the breaks and shut off the engine. "Damn," he said after a moment.

"What?"

"I lost him. I was following a tick in the engine. He's parked somewhere." He waved vaguely to the right. "Out there somewhere. Close, but I don't know exactly--"

He was interrupted by the cell phone. The noise made Jim jump and gasp. Fumbling, Blair answered it. "Sand--"

"Where the hell are you?" That was Simon. Blair winced.

"Funny you should mention that, Simon. I'm not actually--"

"Do you realize Im standing at the IHOP on Berg and Classen looking at a dead body?"

"Oh."

Jim seized possession of the phone.

"We followed the shooter, Sir."

"I see. Shall I assume you have him in custody?" Simon's voice was loud enough that Jim had to hold the phone several inches from his head.

"Well, no not exactly. He's close, but--"

"Can you find him?" and then, "Jim do you need me to seal off an area--"

"No! No, sir, I can find him. Let's not tip him off. I'm hoping he's lead me to his partners."

"Are there partners?"

"Well, we already know this isn't a solo operation. The body you've got is one of theirs. His back-up must have been afraid he'd talk."

"Crap."

"You said the FBI is involved in this. Can you try talking to them again? I mean," and his voice was mild, despite the look he gave Blair, which was bitter and snide, "They're going to want to collect this body, too right? It's only courtesy to give them a heads up, have a little chat."

"Yeah. Right--" Simon's volume dropped, and whatever else was said was lost to Blair. Then, Jim closed the phone and opened the door.

"Where are we going?" Blair asked, undoing his seat belt.

Jim glanced at him. "Find us a murderer. Or several."

One of the hardest things a sentinel could do was urban tracking. To their advantage, Jim wouldn't be trying to follow spore. He'd be depending on hearing. Working against them was the fact that neither of them knew the area.

Jim took a few firm steps up the sidewalk before pausing and throwing an uncertain glance back at Blair.

Blair put a hand on his arm. "Just do it," he said. "Dont think."

And just like that, Jim was pretty much *gone*. He moved forward in bursts, sometimes slowing, sometimes pausing, sometimes changing direction without warning. Usually Blair had to steer around things like lamp posts and dog poop. There wasn't a lot of traffic, which made crossing streets less harrowing, but the real anxiety was that the people they were hunting for might somehow look out a window or come out of a building and see them before Jim had found them.

And, of course, any success hinged on the bad guys *talking* and saying something that gave them away. And sticking around for a few minutes.

Oh, and if somebody's car alarm went off, they were pretty much sunk.

It was cold. Sunny, but windy and much, much colder than it should have been for spring. Colder than it had been for almost a month. Aside from the tips of his fingers, though, Blair was doing fine. It had to be adrenalin, but at this point, Blair was OK with that. As far as he could tell--and he thought he was following things pretty well--the people they were after were spies or assassins who had turned traitor. Somebody in the CIA, or maybe the FBI. Because, hey, legitimate government agents didn't just shoot citizens, right? If you got in their way, they showed up in suits and talked to you politely and dumped you in a room without windows until it was all over, right? So whatever they had run afoul of--whatever message Sam Holland had left on the answering machine--it wasn't a legitimate operation.

So things were pretty serious, and having lots of adrenalin on board was probably a good idea. Even beside its usefulness in ignoring the cold.

They'd been at it for about half an hour when Jim stopped where he was. He slouched slightly, and zoned so hard he wasn't bothering to keep his mouth closed. When it was clear this wasn't going pass in a moment, Blair nudged him sideways, into the lee of the nearest building, so they were out of the wind and had some cover at least.

"Call Simon," he whispered finally. "Find out if the name "Chavez" means anything to him."

Simon answered with "Where the hell have you been!"

"I turned the cell phone off. Jim had his hearing turned up and--"

"You are not going to believe this. I'm standing in the Federal Building. It turns out the FBI agent who came to claim the body this morning was an imposter."

"Oh," Blair said. He didn't know what to say in a situation like this. "Oh."

"The FBI's not going to be much help, though. They've got a mess of their own right now--"

"Simon, Jim thinks he's found something. Do you know the name 'Chavez?'"

"What!" Simon bellowed.

"Chave--Hey, Jim. Damn, there he goes again." Jim was moving. Blair shut and killed the phone, scampering after him.

When Blair caught up, Jim had has back pressed to a brick building. He had his gun out, and while it was clear he was concentrating, he wasn't zoned any more. An icy fury had settled over him, shutting out Blair as tightly as any sensory disassociation.

"Jim?" He hissed. There was no answer. "*Jim*!"

The stillness deepened. Jim was as motionless as marble, and for a moment, Blair panicked. There had never been any sign that Jim was one of those sentinels who zoned so hard and so deeply that they forgot to breathe. If they were dealing with that--

"Here. He's here."

What? Who? And then Blair realized. Oliver.

Jim started to pull away. Blair hauled him back. "Back-up," he said. Hurriedly, holding Jim in place by leaning against his leg, Blair dug the phone back out.

Jim waited until he had finished giving Simon the address, then gently pushed past him and slipped around the building until he came to a door.

It was locked, of course. "Give me your pocket knife," Jim ordered.

Blair handed it over. "We should wait," he whispered. "Warrant. Back-up."

Slowly, Jim dragged his eyes to Blair's face. "They're arguing. They're going to cut and run. If Oliver doesn't--"

Three things happened at once. The lock gave under Jim's hand, and the bold slid back with a thud. A gun shot fired from somewhere in the building. And Jim gasped, dropping both gun and knife and pawing at his head with both hands.

Shit. Shit. But it was too late *now*, after Jim's wide open hearing had been assaulted by the weapon's report. Too little, too late, Blair caught his partner's shoulders and tried to still Jim's frantic efforts to escape the pain in his head. "Breathe through it," he whispered. "Let it go." It was several seconds before Jim calmed down enough for Blair to be able to lay hold of a pressure point that would help. "Easy. You're ok."

Jim trapped his hands and pushed him away. "Damn it," he whispered. But he retrieved the gun and handed Blair back his knife. "I can't hear anything!"

A jolt of panic swept through Blair. While this sort of problem wasn't uncommon and always temporary, this was a bad place for it.

But Jim ground out his answer, "I can't hear them."

"What happened?"

"Somebody wanted to pull out. Said the police were getting too close. Oliver shot him."

Blair blinked at that.

Jim opened the door. "We have to move now."

Like hell. They needed to get Jim's hearing back on line. They needed to wait for back-up.

But even if forcing an argument wasn't stupid and dangerous, there was no point. This was a police decision, and Blair couldn't challenge it. The only option he had was pulling Jim off duty for medical reasons, and even if he tried it, Jim would just ignore him.

Cold and efficient, his gun pointed at the ceiling, Jim entered a narrow hallway. Blair followed him. The only sign that Jim's hearing was still affected was his unusual caution as they crept forward and his pauses at each door to peer carefully inside. The building seemed to be abandoned, though. The rooms that lined the hall were dark and empty.

When Jim came to a set of stairs, he started up at once. Blair followed just behind, grinding his teeth and wishing Simon would hurry with the damn back-up already. On the second floor, Jim paused, and for the first time glanced back at Blair uncertainly. He opened his mouth and then looked around again. "I can't hear them," he breathed.

Blair tapped his nose. "Smell them," he mouthed. Jim nodded and closed his eyes. When he moved again, he still had his eyes closed. He seemed barely there. Blair stayed close, one hand out to catch Jim if he headed toward a wall. He didn't. He led the way through a door to the left--the outer room of some kind of abandoned office suite--and motioned him to be still.

Blair could hear voices now. Not arguing, but urgent. Giving instructions.

When Jim moved it was without warning. He was through the door before Blair could blink. Ducking and scampering, he followed--

Jim had neatly seized a tall, middle-aged blond man. He was holding his gun just behind the man's ear and had angled things so that the captive was between Jim and the two other people. It must have been a very neat move. Blair wondered if he had set it up by smell.

"Put your weapons down," Jim said.

The other two--a man and a woman--each produced a handgun which they slowly stooped and set on the floor.

The man Jim was holding said, "Well, well. Captain Ellison. Long time no see. I see you've showed up just in time to interfere with a federal investigation. That isn't going to look good on your record."

"Shut up. Maybe you didn't get the memo, but I'm a sentinel. I heard everything."

The slippery calm wavered for a moment, and then the captive continued. "I see you're exhibiting your usual competence. How many people are you going to get killed this time?"

Jim shuddered, and the woman *moved.* She didn't bother with her gun, but made a slick, almost invisible leap for Jim's arm.

She underestimated him. Before she could cover half the distance, Jim shot her. Oliver took the distraction to try to pull free. Jim kicked his feet out from under him and caught him in a headlock. Before Blair could blink it was all over.

Blair shut his teeth over a belated scream. The woman was on the floor bleeding. Colonel Oliver dangled from Jim's left arm. The remaining man watched everything else with narrowed eyes.

Blair picked up one of the guns from the floor. He checked the safety, trying not to think about how easy this part was. "Lie down," he said. "On your belly. With your hands on your head." The man appeared to consider. "Now," Blair said. He considered taking Jim's cuffs and securing the prisoner, but decided not to push his luck. A part of his mind was giggling slightly at using "securing the prisoner" in a sentence. Blair thought he might be slightly hysterical.

He glanced at Jim. Jim's face was expressionless, but his captive, while no longer putting up a credible struggle, was turning purple. "Jim? Let him go."

No response. Shit. Shit.

"Jim? Come back right now. Assaulting a prisoner while zoned is a sure way to get fir--" Shit. Shit. Jim wasn't zoned. He was completely present. It was a military expressionless, not a blanked out expressionless.

It occurred to Blair that they really, *really* should have had a conversation about Norman Oliver. For a moment, he panicked. What could he possibly *say* at this point that would be relevant. Oliver had gotten Jim's men killed. He had had Sam Holland tortured and murdered. He'd had Jack shot.

And Jim, apparently, had lost his mind. "Jim?" No, that wasn't going to work. "Cuff the prisoner and read him his rights. God damn it, detective--"

And then, finally, Jim moved. He released the sagging body and stepped back, letting Oliver drop to the floor. Silently, Blair let out the breath he'd been holding. They were ok. They were fine.

Jim cuffed Oliver and recited Miranda. Then he cuffed the other one. His hands were steady, even though his voice shook a little.

"Jim--"

"I hear sirens, finally." Jim took the gun from him and went to check the woman. She was unconscious, but alive. "Chief, I need you to put pressure on this." Blair obeyed, kneeling on the dusty floor and digging out a pad of tissues to use keep the woman's blood from all pouring out.

That made twice in one day, he thought. It was becoming a habit.

Blair could hear sirens himself. Jim took back his cell phone from Blair's pocket and called down to Simon, announcing the building was secure.

Blair looked down at the unconscious woman, the blood all over everything and thought, I should be more upset. Weirdly, though, as the afternoon wore on, he got less upset rather than more. Detectives and cops and ambulance crew zipped in and out with an astonishing speed and certainty. The FBI showed up, and Simon chewed them out, which made Blair want to cheer. The suits actually looked embarrassed.

In fact, the FBI were soon joined by several other federal alphabets. Those who weren't tossing the building were wandering in tense circles or berating subordinates by cell phone. Blair had known, he supposed, just how big this case was. And how dangerous. It made him kind of dizzy, though, to look back and realize just how much Jim had accomplished in a single day.

And Jim wasn't finished. "Simon," he said, as the two healthy prisoners were being led away, "I keep doing the count in my head. There has to be at least one more."

Simon turned away from the fed he was talking to, a degree of rudeness he could apparently get away with today. "Just one?"

Jim thought. "I'm sure of one. Simon, we--"

"We got him forty-five minutes ago. He tried to finish the job on Jack Kelso. Marcia took care of him."

Blair jumped, "What--What happened?"

Simon shrugged. "I didn't see it. Joel was filling in, waiting for the uniforms to take over. Apparently, ex-spook sentinels are really impressive." He turned back to his conversation.

"Let's go," Jim muttered, and without waiting, headed for the door.

"Wait--What? Can we do that?" Blair asked as he hurried after him.

"Not our jurisdiction, Chief. This has nothing to do with us."

"Yeah--but I think that agent Cameron wanted to talk to you."

Jim was already at the stairs. "Trust me. They know where we live."

***

The loft was homey and comforting and almost perfect. A lamp was still missing. It had broken in the robbery. The books from the bookshelf still had to be resorted. Blair found himself wanting to laugh. Fat lot of good it had done them, breaking in and stealing the evidence. Jim had found them anyway. Note to self: do not mess with sentinels.

"What's so funny?" Jim asked, hanging up his jacket.

"Nothing. Nothing, it's just--It's been a long day."

Jim looked at him for a moment. "Yeah. I guess it has. You're pretty wired. You should go drink some tea or something."

Jim telling him to go drink tea really *was* funny, but Jim didn't look the least amused, so Blair pressed his mouth into his hand and swallowed the slightly hysterical laughter down. Jim was right. Blair was wired.

Not sure what else to do, he put on water for the tea and checked the answering machine. Three of the little tapes had come with the thing. They were now down to two. If people were going to keep breaking in and stealing them, they should buy some more.

Blair managed not to laugh at that.

The first message was from Naomi, asking how the vacation went. The second message was from Marcia. Jack was out of ICU, conscious, and labeled "stable."

Blair felt slightly giddy, looking at the machine. He was relieved, but surreal. If surreal was an emotion you could have.... "That's...really good," he whispered. "You know, I think they expel you if you get your advisor killed."

"It wasn't your fault, Chief," Jim said dully. "We should do something for dinner."

Something in his voice brought Blair up short. "Jim? Are you ok? I mean, this was one hell of a day...."

"I'm fine, Sandburg," but the denial was quiet and almost uninterested.

"Are you sure? Because this was some pretty heavy personal shit--"

Jim met his gaze flatly. "I'm not freaking out. I'm dealing with it."

"Ok, that's...that's good."

"There's some frozen soup. How's that for dinner? No bread, but we have some croissants in a tube--"

Slowly, Blair approached Jim. Something was *way* wrong. "Jim? What are you dealing with?"

"We going to play twenty questions here?" But he didn't sound annoyed, just resigned.

Blair tried to smile. "I don't know. How many have I used up already?" Unsure quite what approach to use, he decided to start with guilt. "Come in, give me a break. My job is hard enough. Tell me what's going on."

"This isn't about the senses, Chief. I'm fine. Really. I'm not going to freak out and put myself in a hospital."

When Blair was about five feet away, Jim took a step back. That showed one heck of a big personal space, but Blair stopped moving. "Yeah. Ok. It's not the senses. What is it?"

"Look I just...I have to face that it's all my fault. Okay? But I don't need any crap from you about it--"

"Jim? What was your fault?"

Jim turned away and began to rummage through the freezer for the soup. Blair took a step forward, but stopped when Jim shuddered. Crap.

The phone rang. Blair picked it up: the DEA. He told them Jim was in the shower. They told him that Jim had an appointment at the federal building at eight the next morning.

"Thanks," Jim said, and put the tupperware box of frozen soup into the microwave.

They watched the numbers count backwards for two and a half minutes. Then Jim turned the soup and started it again. Blair gave up and turned on the oven. When he started to lay the pre-made croissants on a baking sheet, though, Jim came and nudged him out of the way. "You're rolling from the wrong corner," he said. "They'll be lopsided."

"Jim that's...really picky."

"Almost worthy of Adrian, I know." Jim tried to smile, failed. "I knew Oliver was dirty. For months. But I didn't have any evidence and I followed the rules and I was too stupid to even think.... Afterward, when I knew it had been him, when I knew what he'd done...I shot my mouth off, but that didn't accomplish anything. He was so good at covering his tracks. But I knew. I should have just shot him. It would have saved all those people his drug running killed. And Holland. And Kelso."

Whoa.

Blair reached around Jim and turned off the oven. "Dinner can wait. Get your coat, let's go."

Jim looked puzzled. "Where? You know, this bossy guide thing, it doesn't suit you."

"Jack is going to be fine. You need to see that. Let's go." A lie. Blair was in way over his head. He needed Jack's help.

"That doesn't change--"

"You're not hungry. We might as well do this as pretend to eat. Let's go."

Jack was in a private room, still under guard. The uniformed cops took their ID's and then called in to their supervisor before letting them in. Apparently, the guy who had made it past Joel that afternoon had had really convincing ID that said he was FBI.

Jack was awake and sitting up. He was still pale, but his color had improved from "frightening" to "live human," which was good. He also looked a lot older, but that might just be because he had his glasses off.

Blair paused in the door way and Jim eased behind him. Almost as though he were afraid. Or ashamed. Damn. "Uh, hi? Jack? How are you feeling?"

A wan smile. "Wonderful. I hear you boys got Oliver."

"Um. Um, yeah. Jim found him. It turns out he was trying to kill an undercover DEA agent before the agent could come in and finger him. A lot of stuff seems to be coming out."

"Very nice."

"So, where is Marcia?"

"Sent her home to pack. No chance she's staying there after today."

Jim hadn't said anything during this exchange, but he had slowly eased his way out from behind Blair. Now he moved over to the bed and sat in the chair Marcia must have vacated. He laid one hand on Jack's stomach. It was a position Blair had seen diagrams of. It was the most common diagnostic position used by sentinel doctors. It had to be intuitive. This wasn't something he'd been taught. "Jim," he said gently. "You need to ask first."

Jim glanced up at him. "What?"

Jack flipped his free hand slightly, motioning Blair to be silent. "How am I doing?"

Jim's jaw ground silently for a moment. "You're working very hard."

"Jim--"

"I'm so sorry," Jim whispered.

"It wouldn't have made a difference if you'd been there. Campus was crowded. Classes were changing. The air was very cold, it wouldn't carry smell very well--"

"That isn't what he means," Blair said miserably. "He thinks--"

Jack motioned him to be quiet again. "Pretty heavy, huh, Jim? You thought you were done with this."

"I'm sorry. Oliver...."

"Oliver," Jack said very softly, "is a real piece of work."

"He is a rabid dog. He should have been put down."

"I...see."

"What happened to you was my fault."

Blair opened his mouth to argue, caught himself, and subsided, leaning against the door frame.

"I knew what Oliver was, and I...didn't stop him. I think that's why Blair brought me here. He's afraid I can't live with it. Knowing what Oliver did because I didn't stop him."

"Jim...I should probably explain something." Jack paused, breathing. When he spoke again, though, his voice was louder and stronger. "I would *rather* be dead than live in a country where people are 'stopped' because of suspicion."

"I'm not--"

"Yes. You are. I believe in the courts. The laws restrain everyone. Or you might as well not have them."

"Fuck," Jim whispered. He tried to pull away. Jack caught his hand.

"This is a trade I am willing to make. You are going to have to live with that."

Jim closed his eyes. Jack waited.

"He killed them. He sent us into a trap."

"I know." Something seemed to pass between them, an acknowledgement of something dark and terrible. Whatever it was, Blair couldn't quiet get his mind around it.

Footsteps in the hall. Marcia brushed past Blair. She was carrying an overnight bag. "You shouldn't be here," she said. "He's tired."

Jack glanced at her briefly. "Not now," he murmured. Marcia cast Jim a last dirty look but gave in.

"I don't understand," Jim said. "How did you learn to be soft?"

"I didn't have a choice. My hardness was killing the people who...depended on me." His voice had grown so quiet that Blair could hardly hear and his free hand moved restlessly, fumbling at the bed control.

Anxious, Blair asked, "Jack? Are you in trouble?" Surely, he had to be ok. He looked like hell, but neither sentinel was panicking. He had to be ok.

"Just want to sit up a little more." And Marcia was suddenly beside him, across the bed from Jim. She adjusted the bed and offered some water. Blair had never imagined her gentle.

"I did a lot of damage...."

"Stop it," Marcia said.

"I'll be making up for it the rest of my life. Giving you to Blair...From the beginning, he'll be the guide I should have been."

"Hush," Marcia said.

"No," Jack said. "There's so much he has to learn, if he's going to survive. He's got to learn to let the pain pass through him. He's got to learn to be vulnerable. He's...got to hope. Or he'll die. It's so hard to hope. It took me so long, and you're just now beginning to learn it. I can't do it for him, Marcia. I couldn't do it for you...."

"Enough," Marcia whispered. "For today, it's enough. Tomorrow, I promise, I'll let you save the whole world."

This time, when Blair approached Jim, he didn't pull away. He let Blair hug him gently, then coax him into standing. "Call us," Blair said to Marcia. "If you need anything."

"Oh, yes," she answered. "You owe him."

In the hall, Blair turned to Jim and whispered, "He wasn't coherent."

"Coherent enough." And then, "The pain medicine was cycling through. *Not* like over the counter stuff. I can see why he doesn't want Marcia there. He's sweating out all kinds of toxic garbage. I can also see why she won't leave, though."

Toxic? Lovely. He would have to be sure his own sentinel got cleaned up. "Are you ok?"

Jim shrugged. "Eventually. Jack's right. It is better this way. It just...."

"Hurts."

"Yeah. He was right about that, too."

***

Mercifully, Sandburg didn't make him talk on the way home. To forestall any talking after they arrived, Jim fled to the bathroom as soon as he got in the door. It only bought him about half a minute.

"Jim? I'm really sorry, man--"

"I'm fine. Leave me alone."

"Jim, I know you don't want to hear this now--"

That was right. He didn't.

"--but you really need to shower."

Whatever he'd been expecting, that wasn't it. He cracked the door and snapped, "What?"

"You need to wash off whatever you were exposed to at the hospital. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. We have to deal with this--"

"This? Who cares about this?" He had just a moment of fleeting anxiety and regret, and then he was standing in the hall bellowing at Blair. "Who cares about this!"

"Well, I--"

"*Jack was right*, do you understand? Jack was right. I couldn't have done anything else. And that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter that he was right, because they're all dead!"

He started to push past his astonished guide, to flee, but then he changed his mind. "Do you remember the Switchman case, Chief?"

"Um, yeah. That was...one of yours, wasn't it?"

"Oh, yeah. It was one of mine. One of mine. A nut case ran around Cascade and Seattle for three months blowing buildings up because she was personally angry at me."

"I don't...what?" Blair was looking at him in bewilderment.

"Her father was one of my men. One of the ones who died. And she blamed me. And look, she was right--"

"Jim, the Switchman was crazy. Even I got that much, and I don't watch the news--"

Jim threw his hands up. "Well, even a broken clock is right twice a day. Only once if it's military, but hey. Veronica Sarris nailed this one. I followed the rules. I did my job. I *couldn't* have done anything else. And it was still my fault."

Blair was already shaking his head before Jim finished. "No. Some people made choices to do evil things. None of that was your fault. It hurts, and it feels like guilt or blame, but your responsibility--"

"I followed the rules!" Jim screamed. The words hurt, and left a gash of pain inside him.

"Oh, god," Jim smelled tears, not his own, Blair's, and the surprise of that made everything slightly surreal. Why would Blair be crying? "They told you if you followed the rules everything would be fine...but they lied. I'm sorry."

Oh. God. Yes. They'd lied.

Why was that a surprise? He'd known his father hadn't told him the truth about a lot of things. He'd known that his drill instructor had said...so many things they all knew weren't true. He'd known for years that Oliver was lying to the army and to the government, and that Sam was lying to himself....

"Jim, I'm sorry. I thought you knew."

Surely, on some level, he'd known. This shouldn't be a surprise. It felt, though, like he'd been hit in the head with an axe. He must have looked pretty bad, too, because Blair took his arms and sat him in the floor. "Too late," Jim muttered, and vomited onto the floor between his knees.

He hadn't eaten all day. All that came up was a thin, yellow mucus that burned on the way out. He would have gotten back up and headed for the bathroom again, but Blair kept him still, muttering, "I've got it, I've got it. Don't move."

He was back in a moment with damp paper towels and a cup of cool water. "Little sips, Jim. Try to calm down. You're all right."

Jim never could remember much of that evening later. There was a shower involved. At one point he looked down to discover half a cup of broth and part of a croissant, neither of which he recognized as having eaten. If they talked, Jim was never sure what was said.

He woke up the next morning still on the couch with his head in Blair's lap. It would have been embarrassing, but after the hysteria and the vomiting and who knew what else, this hardly even seemed worth mentioning.

Blair, at least, was kind enough not to mention it. He did barely let Jim out of his sight all day, but since that meant he sat in on all of Jim's debriefings (which, in turn confounded the feds), he figured it was a fair trade. All in all, three different government agencies called Jim in for a chat, and each of them was disconcerted when two people sat down instead of one. "He is a police officer on duty. You cannot require him to work without a guide. The Occupational Health and Safety laws are very definite."

"Well, yes, Mr. Sandberg. But a guide is hardly necessary here in the office. Usually...well, it's more efficient to take your report separately."

"It's not customary for a guide to give a report at all. In Cascade, guide is a civilian position."

And however much the suits would hint that Blair would be more comfortable somewhere else, he just smiled and politely said, no, thank you. Jim supposed that if he'd had access to any current information that was classified, they might have lost in the end. As it was, it was probably passive-aggressive to sit back and let Blair--oh, very nicely--insist on things like lunch, but it was all the revenge Jim was going to get--

God, they had been good men. They had *done* their jobs. They'd tried.

He pushed those thoughts out of his mind as they went over (and over, and over) the events of the previous day.

Then never even made it into the station at all. At five, Blair's polite guide persona called it a night. They stopped for Wonderburger and dropped by the hospital. Jack was better, but it would be at least a week before they'd let him go home. As awful a place as a hospital was to be--and as much as Jim sympathized--that was probably the best thing. Jim's medical training had been mostly for combat situations, and none of it had taken the sentinel perceptions into account, but while he couldn't name the complications that might be lurking, he could feel in his gut that things were precarious still.

They didn't stay long. Jack still tired pretty easily, and besides, Marcia made it clear that she found their presence irritating. Jim really hoped he wasn't that unpleasant.

***

Jim was unusually quiet for the rest of the week. His discharge of firearm had bought them both three days on desk duty. Blair hovered. Stress was a killer for people who had average senses. And really in the scheme of things, Jim hadn't been well for all that long.

But nothing alarming happened. Jim ate. He slept. He developed no rash, no spontaneous swelling in the joints or throat. He didn't freak out again. Maybe things were under control.

Blair didn't push it, though. He kept himself available, but didn't offer to talk. If Jim *wanted* to talk, well...but he didn't feel equipped to deal with this level of trauma.

They were busy, even with the desk duty. Sharona Fleming was on vacation visiting her mother in New Jersey, which meant that Adrian was taking his vacation days and spending them at home. When they weren't filling out reports or talking to IA, Jim and Blair spent most of the rest of the week on loan to forensics.

As a detective, Jim made a really kick-ass sentinel. As a forensic specialist, it turned out he was no Adrian Monk. Serena complained that Jim's approach was sloppy. Caroline said he took too long. And his reports were poorly organized. Jim said the next time they wanted someone to sniff a crime scene that stank like old gym socks, they could sniff it themselves. Blair suggested that Jim try some continuing ed, which was when Jim caught him in a headlock and gave him a wedgy. That was Friday morning. It was the most animation Blair had seen out of his partner since they got back from the retreat. Blair let himself hope it was a good sign.

That night, Jim had plans to go with Adrian to a movie. Sharona had made Adrian promise to leave the house once while she was gone. He was willing to try it "guideless," but not completely alone. Blair wasn't holding out much hope for their evening: Adrian hated movies, and besides, he was afraid of the dark. Jim was determined to go through with it, though, and Blair had to admit that a part of his enthusiasm might have to do with the fact that Jim hadn't been free of his own babysitter in days. So he had his fingers crossed for them.

They'd taken separate cars to work, so when Jim left to pick up Adrian, Blair headed over to the hospital. There was no cop on the door, but Marcia and Joel were both inside with Jack, and Blair paused at the threshold. "Am I interrupting police work?" he asked.

"Oh," Joel said. "No. No. I just stopped by to check on things."

Marcia smiled. "They're letting him out tomorrow," she said.

"Hey, that's great."

"Marcia, why don't you take Captain Taggart down to the cafeteria for some coffee. I need to talk to Blair alone."

"I can do better than that," Joel said. "There's a little pizza place across the street. We could even bring something back."

Marcia said sternly to Jack, "No pizza."

Jack sighed. "I could have salad. Or spaghetti."

"Mmmm. All right."

When they were left alone, Blair said neutrally, "I take it you're getting tired of the food?"

"It's not unusually bad, really. At least she's stopped fussing about my diet." He winked at Blair. That last had clearly been meant for the sentinel who would still be near enough to overhear them. "Where's Jim?"

"Sentinels' night out. He's with the forensics guy. Do you know him?"

"Only by reputation. Poor Jim."

Blair gauged that there was enough hospital between Marcia and this room that they could be considered actually alone. He sat down. "How are you feeling?"

"Not bad. I'm ahead of schedule, actually. I put responsibility for that squarely on Marcia. I'm on my third antibiotic, and she was the one who knew the first two weren't working long before anyone else had a clue."

"Jack, I'm so sorry. I never should have gotten you involved--"

"You didn't ask. And I could have said, no....Blair, as a guide, you have your priorities straight. I can't argue with that, and I won't fault you for it."

"But--"

"I'm just annoyed at how far this puts me behind in my research. I was hoping to be able to have something really solid to say at this year's AAAG."

"Ah. I bet that's my cue to volunteer with data entry."

"Good boy." Jack squirmed a little. He was holding himself stiffly, and Blair had spent too much time watching for pain in the last half-year or so not to see that things were not quite as good as Jack had said.

"Do you need me to leave?" he asked quietly.

"No." Carefully, trying not to jog the stitches along the side of his neck, he squirmed again. "In my last job, I got hazard pay when people shot at me."

"And you didn't have to do the faculty wine and cheese on Friday nights."

"At least I got out of that. So how's Jim?"

And even though he felt guilty as hell, leaning on Jack for advice after everything else the man had given them, Blair pounced on the question with relief. "He needs to be in therapy! But there's no way in hell. You have no idea how stigmatized--"

"I know exactly how stigmatized."

"--he would be. Right. Well, he won't even talk about it."

"Is he zoning?"

"No."

"Nightmares?"

"Not that I know about."

"You know, Blair, you can make me the heavy. If you say I'm requiring it, as part of your evaluation...."

"We can send him to the doctor, but we can't make him talk, Jack. And besides....to *force* him. After Brackett, I can't see--Oh, god, I forgot to tell you. We have a court date for some kind of hearing next week. I managed to put the DA off, but he wants to see us first thing Monday. Crap! I don't know how either one of us is going to cope with this--

Jack closed his eyes. "Ok. First, you have to calm down. Right? And then we'll talk about contingency plans."

***

Jim really wished he'd agreed to "Balto," even though it was a cartoon. But, no. Jim had lobbied for "Die Hard, With a Vengeance." An action movie, he'd said. Some excitement, he'd said. Explosions without consequences, he'd said.

His right arm was going to sleep. Adrian had grabbed it in both hands and was squeezing. Even through the jacket Jim had on in the chilly theater, he was cutting off the circulation pretty efficiently.

But even the tingling in his fingers was a minor issue compared to the embarrassment of having Adrian's face buried in his shoulder. Really, they should have seen "Balto."

Adrian whimpered something that might have been, "Tell me when it's over," but might have been something else. Whatever it was, it was loud enough to make the people just in front of them glance back. Flushing with embarrassment, Jim wondered how much cover the darkened theater gave them to un-sentinel eyes. Not enough, clearly, because one of the guys in the next row was sniggering.

Sentinels are so weird, he thought. And then, Whatever they pay Blair, it's not enough.

\--Epilog--

It turned out that Joel Taggart was actually very pleasant. He was polite. He listened. He didn't lie casually, the way most men did. And when you got past his aftershave, he smelled kind of nice. It was almost alarming. Marcia couldn't remember the last time she had actually *liked* anybody.

She hated the claustrophobia and vibration of elevators almost enough to walk up to the tenth floor, but Joel's current story was distracting enough to make it bearable. "So now," he was saying, "his desk is covered with all these brochures. You know, for archaeological vacations. The kind where you pay some college money for the privilege of excavating some old latrine or garbage pit."

Despite what the elevator was doing to her inner ear, Marcia laughed. "You're kidding."

"Oh, no. Brown has it narrowed down to two: a historic site outside of Boston, and a thousand year old Indian village in New Mexico. He'll have to send in a deposit for one or the other by next week."

"And I thought the National Parks Service was weird!"

"The National Parks Service?" The elevator doors opened, and Joel stood aside so she could exit first.

"Well, come to think of it, it was mostly the tourists that were eccentric...." Automatically, her hearing stretched out for her guide. He was lecturing the student on patience, grace, and living in the moment. It was, she thought, a lecture he was very good at, but even from the other end of the hall, she could hear the strain in his voice. Between the torn muscles on the side of his neck and the pain medication, everything was two or three times harder than normal. And frankly, even at the best of times, things were hard enough. That idiot Sandburg, for all that he was a trained guide, would never notice--

"Marcia? Marcia? Hey."

She started and looked away, suddenly embarrassed. She never used to zone. She didn't often now, but she'd done it here, in public, in front of Joel. Who had surely recognized it. Who smelled slightly worried and sympathetic. "Sorry," she said quickly. "Look, could you do me a favor? Your friend Sandburg has been here long enough. If you can move him along gently, Jack won't give me dirty looks for throwing him out."

"Oh. Sure. No problem. I'm sure Jack doesn't need to be up all night talking shop."

"I appreciate that." She'd had to remind herself about saying thank-you, but the smile was natural enough.

It took almost four minutes by Marcia's internal clock--which, while not what it was, was still accurate to thirty seconds on the hour--for Joel to lure the whiney student away. It was longer than she would have liked, but at least it was polite. As soon as they were gone, she shut the door and unpacked the take-out box. Jack eyed it hopefully. "What did you get?"

"Chicken pasta salad with sun dried tomatoes and that funny cheese. It won't be bad, actually. Don't look at me like that. Spaghetti and meatballs would be cold by now."

"So it has nothing to do with cholesterol or calorie content." He was looking a little smug, pleased that he could predict her.

She pretended to ignore his statement. "Also, this will be easier to eat left-handed." She adjusted the tray and laid out the food. "You don't have to eat it all, but finish the chicken. You are crying for protein."

"Yes, mom." Beneath that tease, though, he sounded slightly annoyed. He wasn't use to being fussed over. She squeezed his good shoulder and leaned over to bury her nose in his hair. Touch had been different between them when they'd been working together. Then it had been an efficient communication. Jack had monitored her with his hands, directed her attention, set her boundaries. Since retirement, though, he'd become downright....snuggly. Touch had become about affection and state of mind. He had used it, when she was sick, to comfort and steady her, to coax her body out of fighting itself. It wasn't the sort of tool, though, that you could use and still keep a professional distance. She knew how to touch him to make his smell lose its irritated or anxious edge. He was, from beginning to end, her dearest friend. When she used her hands to remind him of that, he stopped fighting the world.

Jack sighed. "Can you handle me at home? I have to admit, I'm a little worried."

Ah. Here was the problem. He could not transfer by himself. He could not do his exercises by himself. He could barely feed himself. It would be another week before any of this improved. Marcia pulled away and began to straighten the room. "We are not staying here. Besides, until the stitches come out, it isn't like you can do any real useful therapy. Might as well be there as here. We're going home tomorrow."

"You are very stubborn."

"Yes, and that's one of my good qualities. Eat."

"Are you listing the nagging as a good quality, too?" But he was picking at the food tiredly.

She took the fork and began to fish out bits of chicken. "It's only for a couple of weeks. We'll watch a lot of television. You'll read that new biography of Burton. You can grill those grad students who have taken over your classes. This is no problem."

"Right. No problem."

"I don't like this double standard. You never let me get all defeatist and depressed-smelling."

He managed a silent laugh. "Don't censor you by smell...."

"Jack. It will be all right. You've been through much worse than this. I mean...this is isn't *anything*, not to you. Not to us."

"Right...." She would have to accept that. He really was too tired to argue further. She gave up on the dinner he was too tired and sore to chew and took the container away. She could argue more tomorrow. There was plenty of time to bring him around.

~end~


End file.
